NEA Teachers & School Board Supports Student Walkout To Advocate Gun Control While Missing "Education" Time

Parents, do you know where your children are? If you have a school-age child, are you sure your child is attending class? Did you sign a permission slip for your child to be absent from school in order to join teachers in the National Education Association and your State's teachers' union to miss education time to protest for gun control, oops, people control, and gun confiscation legislation?

Today, Wednesday, March 14, 2018, over 2,500 schools nationwide are participating in a "school walkout" to promote gun control, aka people control. The union officials have advised caution to teachers in their support for the students, making sure it is as a private citizen.

Teachers unions at the state and national levels are supporting what they say are student-driven protests demanding changes to the Second Amendment since the Parkland, Florida, shooting that claimed the lives of 17 people.

Union officials, however, are advising teachers to be cautious about ensuring their support for the students – from over 2,500 schools that are participating in a “student walkout” Wednesday to promote gun control – is provided as private citizens.

While urging its members to “avoid any suggestion that they are speaking in their official capacity or on behalf of their local school district,” Oklahoma Education Association (OEA), for example, says the National Education Association (NEA) and its state affiliates support this “inspired movement” by students.

“Thoughts and prayers will not prevent the next tragedy,” said NEA President Lily Eskelsen García. “People rising up will.”

Excuse me, but if the NEA and local teachers' unions are supporting this, then these teachers and organizations are doing so in a professional capacity, particularly, when this "walkout" is occurring during school hours when teachers should be working to educate children, not fostering "skipping" class for whatever reason. Moreover, teachers should not be supporting any disruption in the learning environment by students attempting to make a "political statement."

NEA Today, the flagship publication of the National Education Association, carried a column that begins, "There’s a new face on the age-old gun debate: our students, and they won’t be silenced. They are demanding that the adults in power keep them safe and they will not stand by and allow elected officials to fail them any longer." After two paragraphs, the author, using bold print, writes, "Stand Up For What You Believe In." That sounds like an official support for the student walkout, which is contrary to instructions to support the students as "a private citizen."

Denisa R. Superville at Education Week writes, "The dominant call for action tied to the national walkout is for stricter gun laws, including a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines and expanded background checks for prospective gun-buyers. Inspired by the activism of a small, but vocal group of student survivors from Stoneman Douglas, students across the U.S. have already staged dozens of walkouts in the weeks since the Feb. 14 mass shooting."

Some school districts, like Hartford County, Maryland, are banning students from walking out, saying students will be disciplined for doing so.

The organizer of the walkout, The Women's March Youth Empower, is asking students to walkout at 10 a.m. in each time zone on the one month anniversary of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting for 17 minutes – one minute for each individual killed in the shooting.

Now, if anyone knows anything about teenagers and children, seventeen minutes will actually turn into about an hour.

There is nothing wrong with engaging in civil activism; however, these children, who are still in school and learning, should not be encouraged to skip class, even with school approval, to engage in activism. Students can engage in 17 minutes of silence inside the classroom in remembrance of the tragedy. Activism should be done outside of school hours, if the children wish to do so and with parental approval.

Here's the issue: the courts kicked prayer out of school because it was labeled as government "establishing a religion." If religion cannot be promoted in school, then a particular set of political ideas should not be promoted either. And, while parents can be held accountable in some states for their children "skipping" class and truancy, then the school system should not be supporting an absence from school for political reasons, nor supporting the students. Despite the unions and educators' association claiming support has to be done as "private citizens," some school boards are supporting this move as a government entity on school time.

And, suppose there are some students who are not supportive of gun control, aka people control, and gun confiscation. What are they to do for the time their fellow students and teachers are engaging in activism on school time, with teachers getting paid to do so, but neglecting other students? Are they going to be allowed equal time to engage in civil activism to promote their beliefs? No one has to be a genius to answer that question.

And, in another display of teachers engaging in "private citizen" support for the student activism, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) has a site called "Share My Lesson" where "teachers are encouraged to use a classroom activity to 'share students' solutions to gun violence'."

At the AFT site called “Share My Lesson,” teachers are encouraged to use a classroom activity to “share students’ solutions to gun violence.” The article on which the lesson plan is based is a PBS opinion piece that promotes gun control and views the NRA as an organization that “has silenced our government.”

Some parents battling against the federal intrusion in the school system are upset by the organized activity claiming it promotes a "progressive agenda." These parents are right; it does promote the progressive agenda of gun/people control and gun confiscation.

Heidi Huber, an Ohio activist, states this walkout has nothing to do with keeping children safe while at school.

"What better setup for another tragedy, than to announce when there will be hundreds of children – yes, children – allowed by school authorities to leave the safety of their secure classrooms and exit to the unsecured outside campus?" Ms. Huber asks.

She added, "Couple that with the left’s righteous claim of exercising First Amendment rights – wait for it – to protest the existence of Second Amendment rights. And while you attempt to square that position, the voice of the ‘reasonable’ continue to proclaim that a 15-17 year-old is mature enough to determine that an 18-21 year-old is not mature enough to own a firearm."

This statement by Ms. Huber says it all and is what many of us have been saying – school children, children mind you, are immature and not adults; therefore, "children" have no authority to instruct adults in unconstitutional gun legislation or determine which adults should or should not own firearms. Moreover, children who have been through such a tragedy as this do not automatically become "experts" in firearms, the Constitution, or gun violence.

Ms. Huber notes that the weight of this irony "is lost since the ones in charge of the schools and the media have lost the ability to critically think. Well, that is, if they ever had it in the first place. Huber went on to claim that a generation of America children are lacking in critical thinking skills as well. Of course, the lack of critical thinking skills in these children has been proven by David Hogg and his giddy gun-grabbing group of gambol goons.

Heather Crossin, an Indiana parent, claims the radical left has stooped to new lows. She told Breitbart the school walkouts were the latest stunt of "radical leftist using minors to fight their battles."

"'Asking them to disrupt learning time, during the regular school day, to make a political statement is unconscionable,' she adds. 'It shows what little regard national organizers actually have for the students whose individual schools they hope to destabilize or for the adults who are charged with running them'."

It might be a rather novel idea, but wouldn't it be better if these teachers put as much energy into actual teaching instead of indoctrination. The best idea is for parents to remove their children from state-sanctioned education, aka government-run indoctrination centers disguised as schools, and educate children at home. But, if that is not possible, just know that your children are being indoctrinated into an anti-constitutionalist mindset and value system. And, today, your children missed valuable learning time because of the ignorance of student activists led by David Hogg, supported by the teachers' unions, teachers and school boards, the Women's March Youth Empower and the NEA, whether participating in the walkout or not.

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Suzanne Hamner

Suzanne Hamner (pen name) is a registered nurse, grandmother of 4, and a political independent residing in the state of Georgia, who is trying to mobilize the Christian community in her area to stand up and speak out against tyrannical government, invasion by totalitarian political systems masquerading as religion and get back to the basics of education.

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